Federal officers are detaining and arresting anti-ICE agitators who call themselves “legal observers” under a statute forbidding interference of law enforcement operations.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers have arrested about 655 people under the statute, which is double the number of similar arrests from the same period a year ago, according to a Reuters review.
The statute forbids anyone from assaulting, resisting, intimidating, or interfering with federal officials engaged in ‘the performance of official duties.’
“When agitators willingly involve themselves and inject themselves in law enforcement operations, they are risking arrest as well as jeopardizing the safety of themselves and those around them,” said Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin to Reuters.
The statute forbids anyone from assaulting, resisting, intimidating, or interfering with federal officials engaged in “the performance of official duties.”
Just what constitutes interfering is being challenged in the courts. U.S. District Judge Kate Menendez of Minnesota had ruled that federal agents could not stop vehicles if they were a distance deemed “safe” and “appropriate.” The Department of Homeland Security appealed the ruling.
Illegal alien advocates claim that federal officers are acting unlawfully by arresting observers.
“As seen in Minneapolis and elsewhere, anyone who encounters immigration agents and attempts to criticize or even simply to record them — or who is just on the scene observing or trying to help — can be subjected to aggressive questioning or other retaliation,” reads a statement from the American Immigration Council.
“Federal agents have attempted to charge protesters and observers with ‘obstructing’ or ‘interfering with’ law enforcement operations, sometimes arguing that by being in the way of federal agents or vehicles they are violating federal law,” the group added.
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Some politicians, like California Rep. Jimmy Gomez, a Democrat, have conducted classes to train people as legal observers.
“Unless the American public sees the killing of Alex Pretti, the killing of Renee Good, it wouldn’t penetrate,” Gomez said to CBS News. “They wouldn’t believe it, that agents meant to protect them are harming them.”
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